Ariadne auf Naxos

[Tsaraslondon]

I fell in love with this opera many years ago, in an amazingly realistic Glyndebourne Touring Production at the Theatre Royal in Newcastle upon Tyne. I'm afraid I can't tell you who the singers were, but the production was indeed magnificent. The curtain rose on the Prologue to reveal the backstage, or rather under stage of an old theatre, everything in wood, with a large rickety wooden staircase leading to the stage. So detailed was the set, that as the doors opened to the various dressing rooms, you could see beyond them to the mirrors and the gas lamps around them. In fact, I remember an announcement to the effect that the interval would be 40 minutes long "as it takes us that long to change the set", not of course a problem at Glyndebourne itself, with their long supper intervals.
The set for the opera itself seemed a tad disappointing after that, just dull grey rocks and caves, but as Theseus and Ariadne sang their final duet the rocks and caves transformed themselves into glittering caverns, while their ship appeared to sail forwards into the audience, water ( actually dried ice) furling over its bows. This must have been around 40 years ago, but I remember it very clearly, and it encouraged me to buy the Karajan recording with Schwarzkopf, which has remained with me, in one form or another, throughout my life.

[J.Z. Herrenberg]

Beautiful, Tsaraslondon!

[Guido]

Amazing! It's a glorious opera. And really, I think the prologue is an absolute masterpiece from start to finish, one of the finest things Strauss and Hoffmanthal managed together, and the opera proper, beautiful and wonderful though it is, can't quite match up to the incredibleness of the prologue. Has anyone seen the opera proper staged really convincingly? The Met production is very dull.

Voice types for Zerbinetta then - what are people's thoughts? For me it has to floating, light, effortless - Rita Streich or Kathleen Battle types. I love both in this role. Whilst looking at the score yesterday I was following through, and Battle is just sailing through top Cs, making them sound like they were As! Have top Cs ever sounded so sweet? Strange because the comment that Met goers always make is that she had difficulty with her top and high Es were a real challenge. No evidence fo that here.

Not so keen on Gruberova or Hilde Gueden - seem far too grand dame-y, hard edged, heavy and uncoquettish for me. Similarly I couldn't imagine Christine Schaeffer in this role (she's definitely done it recently). There's got to be such a contrast between Ariadne and her.

[Harry Powell]

Battle's fidelity to the score seems rather stochastic when one listens to Gruberova (a bit too serious, yes) or Dessay.

I don't know who told Battle she was an agility soprano, she should have stuck to her soubrette roles. Shrill at the top (you just have to look at her faces when she took a C) imprecise coloratura and always the same childish expression.

[Guido]

Battle's fidelity to the score seems rather stochastic when one listens to Gruberova (a bit too serious, yes) or Dessay.

I don't know who told Battle she was an agility soprano, she should have stuck to her soubrette roles. Shrill at the top (you just have to look at her faces when she took a C) imprecise coloratura and always the same childish expression.

No I love her here. I don't find the top shrill at all (very occasionally the top E is, but then again there's only very few singers who avoid shrillness every time) - as I say, I've never heard such effortless top Cs. Amazing how we all hear voices so differently. Can't believe you prefer Dessay's hooting! Actually Dessay in her prime was ok, and very nice in this role, but I've never much liked the voice or the musician or the actress, and now the voice is just horrible to hear. She's similar to Damrau in some ways - the lack of elegance, bulging phrases, erratic and too wide vibrato, the constant feeling of struggle, even when the coloratura is managed. Both can do great things, but they come all too rarely in my opinion.

[Guido]

I love stochastic used in this context! I've only ever used it in relation to my scientific research!

(and obviously I disagree!)

[knight66]

Rita Streich was well fitted to that role. She brought out the playfulness and had the equipment to encompas it. Sumi Jo also was very good. I like Battle, but her tone becomes unvaried as she moves upwards.

Mike

[Harry Powell]

Dessay was a consummate virtuoso something I'd never apply to Battle.

[Guido]

I must endeavour to hear more of Dessay at her peak, obviously. I've never been impressed by anything of hers, but clearly I need to look earlier - what CD(s) do you recommend?

[kishnevi]

Specific to this thread, although not a CD, you might want to try the DVD of Ariadne released by the Met last year, with Voigt as the Prima Donna/Ariadne, Margison as the Tenor/Bacchus, and  Mentzer as the Composer, and Dessay as Zerbinetta.   The performance was actually in April 2003; I'd call Dessay the best thing in that performance, and Voigt the worst.

[knight66]

Dessay was a consummate virtuoso something I'd never apply to Battle.

Harry, I have said elsewhere that her vocal technique was dazzling; but that to listen to her involves accepting what is basically uningratiating tone. Over the last three years I bought two of her solo discs: listened once and they now sit on the shelf. For my ears the voice is shallow and unvaried in tone colouring. Watching her is quite different. Her contribution to the Thomas Hamlet DVD is astonishing and she gets something like a seven minute ovation at the end of her mad scene; but take away the remarkable acting and what is left is a voice I don't much like and a marvelous technique. A singer needs to be more than that technique.

Like Guido, I wonder if early discs provide more pleasure. From memory, she had an operation on her throat, was the tone more rounded and varied prior to that? Have you any specific reccommendations or a cut off year after which the pinched sound became evident?

Mike

[Guido]

Just had a root around spotify and it does indeed that her earlier material is more appealing to me. I've so far only been exposed to her work from the last 5 or so years, but the earlier stuff is more effortless, and the vibrato much narrower and faster, the tone more beautiful. And the technique is indeed prodigious. Some very nice mozart singing from 1995 (the Airs de concert disc), but it seems to me that the later one goes the more squall there is.

[Harry Powell]

I'm not a fan of hers, but that set with Mozart arias is indeed a peak of virtuoso singing.

http://open.spotify.com/album/6LL7loz814fBmYm33bqNwT

It never was a rounded or colorful voice. Of course, it was a light instrument whose best features shone on the upper octave. She could even hit an A-flat above high C! After her surgery her range got shorter and she developped into a lyric-léger soprano, but still made an impression in Madrid some years ago. In recent time I feel her support lacks more to desire. I have read she's trying to justify this technical negligence with strange theories. I think she has taken herself too seriously as an actress.

[Harry Powell]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-tSp80N5fo

This was the kind of stuff at which Dessay was amazing. A perfect mechanism plus a recognizable personality to go with it. Listen to the super-high G. That's the kind of showy effect which damaged her vocal chords.

The funny thing is I rank among Dessay skeptics in Spanish forums!

[Guido]

That is quite amazing. I had no idea she was so good early on. I now see why she's such a star. Unfortunately the music could not be more banal! Such crap!

After watching this, I found this clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytwP6zkxdqI&playnext=1&list=PLE4E147E0D8CD8AD9 (Eglise Gutierrez)

I heard her sing at the ROH this year as the fairy godmaother in Cendrillon and was amazed - It's an absolutely gorgeous voice in the theatre (youtube doesn't quite do it justice) She's doing Sonnambula next season there. Can't wait.

Here's "Ah! non giunge"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUZYh4e6qwU&feature=related

[val]

I love the version with Lisa della Casa, the most touching interpreter of Ariadne. A splendid direction of Karl Böhm with the VPO and other extraordinary singers, in special Irmgard Seefried as the Komponist and Hilde Güden as Zerbinetta. 

[mjwal]

I side with Val against Guido in preferring Della Casa in the Böhm live. Her "Ein Schönes war" in particular is achingly poignant. Like Guido I tend to consider this opera the peak of Strauss/Hofmannsthal's production.
By the way, anent the Zerbinetta discussion - I like the Ivogün recording of "Großmächtige Prinzessin" best, but Rita Streich was equally good (better according to Steane). It is amusing to reflect that Ivogün taught Schwarzkopf, who debuted at the Wiener Staatsoper in 1944 with the role of Zerbinetta!